Pit-Stop Precision for Army Platoons

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Bullets and bombs used to be the military's prime concern. But these days, every tin-pot dictator can also brew a lethal stew of biological poison to deploy against American soldiers. The Army has taken notice and come up with a portable biological-agent detector called the Portal Shield.

The upper photo on this page shows an early version of this device, which looks pretty much like an elaborate laboratory instrument stuffed into a steel box. When broken down into backpackable components, it required six hours of assembly.

Enter Dennis Carlson of Carlson Technology. We first met Carlson almost 17 years ago when he invented a cool suit for racing hot shots (C/D, May 1983). By harnessing space-age thermoelectric modules, he created a compact, lightweight, and very reliable cooling system that quickly became a must-have accessory for sweltering races. Keke Rosberg was wearing one when he won the blistering Dallas Grand Prix of 1984.

Through his cool-suit business, Carlson spent a great deal of time with racing teams and became fascinated by the techniques and tactics employed by the successful ones. For example, we all understand that rapid pit work is critical during a race. But Carlson also noticed that the sharper teams also insisted on quick pit stops during practice because they yielded more track time and a better car setup.

Prototype Portal Shield

As a result, when he was perfecting his cool-suit system, he employed quick-release connectors on all of his fluid lines so that the various components could be replaced quickly and easily without tools.

"Hands are the most wonderful tools," Carlson says. "You don't forget them. You don't drop them. And you don't have to worry whether they are English or metric."

While working with the F1 teams, Carlson encountered crew members of many nationalities. So he also color-coded his various electrical and fluid connections to facilitate the correct hookup without requiring any verbal or written instructions. Carlson dubbed this error-resistant, tool-less functionality "pit-stop design." "It's about attention to detail, and its gauge is the stopwatch." Carlson cites the NASCAR technique of gluing the lug nuts to the replacement wheels prior to a race. "When the pressure is on and time is critical, this technique ensures that all the lug nuts are exactly where they are needed, allowing a change of four tires and 20 lugs in mere seconds."

Carlson became so steeped in racing-derived principles that he works out of rented space at the headquarters of McLaren Engines in Livonia, Michigan. These days, the former architect describes himself as a boffin, which is a quaint English term for an all-purpose technical fixer.

While a connection between racing pit stops and military operations seems far-fetched, there are similarities. Although the primary danger of death is from an irate team manager, a pit crew servicing a car during a race, under a green flag, is operating under intense time pressure that's not so different from a soldier's assembling a piece of critical equipment during combat.

Carlson's first connection with the military came about 10 years ago during the Gulf War. His cool-suit expertise brought him to the attention of the Navy, which was developing personal cooling systems for soldiers in hot climates who were wearing suits to protect them from biological and chemical attacks. These MOPP (that's "mission-oriented protective posture," and can these military types produce obfuscating acronyms, or what?) suits are completely sealed and feel like portable steam baths in the Arabian Peninsula. Using his pit-stop design principles, Carlson redesigned the unit to make it smaller and lighter and to allow major component replacement in less than 10 seconds, without tools.

Carlson-massaged Portal Shield

The Army got wind of Carlson's work and asked him to work on the vastly more complex Portal Shield. To detect biological agents, the device sucks in air, checks for large airborne particles, chemically identifies any that are found, and sends out an electrical message if any dangerous substances are identified. The mass of components in the photo directly below suggests the complexity of the task.

Carlson subdivided the various pieces into distinct modules, each of which handled a manageable chunk of the operation -- just as each member of a pit crew is responsible for a clearly defined task during a pit stop. Then he designed each module to plug into the case using automatically coupling electrical and fluid connectors similar to the ones in his cool suits. The modules are all color-coded to match their locations, and the installation of each module automatically triggers an internal diagnostic program that uses LEDs to confirm correct installation. Other LEDs in the corners of the sleek carbon-fiber housing (manufactured by one of racing impresario Jack Roush's shops) facilitate night-time assembly.